Spain's PM: Iraq Should Serve As Lesson

[NNN0LHI]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040502/ap_on_re_mi_ea/spain_zapatero_iraq&cid=540&ncid=1480

MADRID, Spain - Spain's prime minister said Sunday he hopes the deteriorating situation in Iraq (news - web sites) will serve as a warning to countries against using preemptive wars in the future.


"The mission in Iraq, which is showing itself every day to be a failure, should serve as a lesson to the international community: preemptive wars, never again; violations of international law, never again," Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said.


Speaking before some 20,000 supporters at a meeting celebrating the 125th anniversary of the Socialist party, Zapatero reiterated that he had ordered Spain's troops home from Iraq April 18, a day after he was sworn in, "because they should have never been sent there."

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[samsingh]

1. 'violation of international law'

wow - powerful words.

unfortunately very accurate.

[lebkuchen]

4. Wasn't it either Perle or Wolfowitz who admitted the same months ago?

I get those two evil twins mixed up.

[colonel odis]

2. does this mean we'll have to start dumping out our spanish wine?

i hope not. they're making some really nice reds now?

will we be calling spanish fly "freedom fly" now?

bombs over barcelona in the near future, i fear.

way to go, w. you've managed to take our country from world leader to world pariah in a tad over 3 years. and while you'll be in crawford in your retirement, since the business community at large will have no more to do with you afte you leave office than they did before you went into politics, we'll be suffering the consequences.

jerk.

[IndianaGreen]

3. Zapatero: "they should have never been sent there."

Zapatero reiterated that he had ordered Spain's troops home from Iraq April 18, a day after he was sworn in, "because they should have never been sent there."

We need the same commitment to withdraw from Iraq from the Democratic nominee! Zapatero made Spain's withdrawal from Iraq the cornerstone of his campaign, long before the Madrid attack. Zapatero kept his promise and ordered the troops home, which is much unlike American politicians.

[readmylips]

8. Dennis K keeps saying 'bring them home now.'...

If those words came from John Kerry, I think his ratings would double. We've been in a mind-set of war going on 4 years. Our brains are tired. We're ready to be free from war rhetoric. We want to laugh again. Smell the country-side again. Heal our family war differences and unite as family again.

Kerry is not taking an extreme view that is understood to be far away from small man bush's view. He needs to say, 'I will bring the troops home immediately.' Make it a promise. I know he's saying he'll get international cooperation immediately, but that is no hope. Other countries are saying, 'fock you, that's bushe's war. We're not sending our youth to die for bush or for him to get elected.'

This is something that really bothers me.

[Solidarity]

9. Kerry Can't Say That

John Kerry will not say that. Why? Because he will not bring all of our troops home from Iraq.

And some Democratic Party staffers have made it clear on this discussion board here that they support the continued occupation of Iraq. I welcome their honesty.

So what should soldiers and their families who want an end to the occupation do? Who is on their side?

[IndianaGreen]

11. "We have to get out of Iraq. That is the mission we have to accomplish"

This is the reason why I will be voting for Dennis Kucinich, and against John Kerry, in the Indiana primary:

Kucinich Condemns U.S. Abuse of Iraqi Detainees as Acts of Betrayal
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 1, 2004

"We have to get out of Iraq. That is the mission we have to accomplish," he said, ironically echoing President Bush's assertion of victory a year ago today. He again called on the leadership of the Democratic Party to join him in demanding the withdrawal of U.S. troops and a transfer of peacekeeping operations, administration, and management of Iraqi assets and reconstruction contracts to the United Nations.

"We have to stop calling for more troops, more money, and an as-long-as-takes mentality. How can we commit to an occupation without end? How can we allow our men and women in uniform to continue facing even greater risks? How can we tell the world community that we stand for peace and liberty and human rights when our mere presence in Iraq challenges those very same principles?"

http://www.kucinich.us/pressreleases/pr_050104.php

[readmylips]

14. Solidarity: Are you saying...continue

with bushe's war? Kerry should have proclaimed himself agains the war long before Dennis K. and Dean, even if he voted for the war. At some point, Kerry had to see the dissaster of bushe's war. Why didn't he take a stand immediately, to bring the troops home? Adding more fuel to the fire, as Kerry suggests, it's not making us safer, it's not stopping the world from hating us, it's not adding other countries to our side, and it's not stopping our soldiers from being killed.

Besides, the bushes are bringing Saddam's old regime back. The same regime the bushe's declaired war against. This is crazy...what the fock is going on here?

[Solidarity]

19. Nope

No. We should bring our troops home from Iraq now! And if Kerry wishes to oppose those organizations and people, including soldiers family members, who want the soldiers brought home now, he can do so at his own peril.

[Just Me]

20. Thing is,...how do you know WHAT Kerry will do once elected?

He has to WIN first.

That's modern-day, all-American, effin' politics for ya'.

wooo hooo :puke:

The first step towards nabbing that wacked-out pendulum is to get the extreme right-wing OUT OF CONTROL!!!

[Just Me]

5. Wow! A leader that is both intelligent AND human!!!

Wish we had some of those in this country.

:cry:

[IndianaGreen]

7. Zapatero also supports same-sex marriage

and wants legislation to do just that.

I wish we had an American version of Zapatero for Campaign 2004.

[bobthedrummer]

6. Sheesh, he sounds like an American citizen, doesn't he?

[otohara]

16. Not All...There Are Those Murikan's

who disagree with the new PM

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

10. Even though the US RWers call him a coward, there is a leader

with some balls, to speak the truth like that...

[IndianaGreen]

13. Kerry said that Zapatero was coddling terrorism by pulling the troops out

Remember the obnoxious and very offensive phone call that Kerry made to Zapatero chiding him for pulling out of Iraq?

Zapatero is the true progressive in this drama!

[Just Me]

21. Could be the two were "winking" at eachother behind the scenes,...

,...while they really spoke of chewing the asses of neo-fascists.

I'm just offering up a possibility from the "political side".

:bounce:

[IndianaGreen]

24. Spaniards are not like that

They don't play the silly games that Americans are so fond of!

Spaniards wear their emotions openly.

[sushi]

12. I wonder if Bush has learned that lesson

or is he planning to invade Iran if he is selected again.

[IndianaGreen]

15. Zapatero rejects Kerry call on Iraq troops

This is what Zapatero said about Kerry's strange phone call in which Kerry chided him for pulling Spanish troops out of Iraq.

Zapatero rejects Kerry call on Iraq troops
18/03/2004 - 9:03:00 PM

Prime Minister-elect Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero tonight rejected US Democratic presidential hopeful John Kerry’s call for him to reconsider plans to withdraw Spanish troops from Iraq.

Zapatero, the Socialist who won Sunday’s general election, noted that he had campaigned on a pledge to withdraw those 1,300 troops unless the United Nations takes charge in Iraq, and did not devise the plan simply because of last week’s terrorist bombings in Madrid.

“My commitment is my commitment,” Zapatero said in a television interview.

<snip>

“Maybe John Kerry does not know – but I am happy to explain it to him – that my commitment to withdraw the troops goes back before the tragic, dramatic terrorist attack,” Zapatero said.

http://www.breakingnews.ie/2004/03/18/story138844.html

[Voltaire99]

17. Kerry can't hold a candle to Zapatero...

If one is Zapatero, how amusing it must be to be chided by a candidate who is going around criticizing the incumbent's war while planning to continue it.

God, deliver us from Bush-lite!

[Just Me]

23. Hmmm,...I would like to compare their lives,...

,...before accepting your conclusion.

Kerry has a great deal more depth of human experiences than most "polished" politicians I know of. He has experienced war in the flesh, poverty in the flesh, activism in the flesh, divorce in the flesh, wealth in the flesh, betrayal in the flesh, etc...

I guess, from my perspective, having that broad band of human experience can create a fabulous leader. But, that is "Just Me".

[IndianaGreen]

25. Kerry is also a product of the ruling classes & capitalism

the total opposite of a proletarian like Zapatero!

Someone like Zapatero will see health care as a human right that should be universal and free to all.

I doubt that Kerry would betray his capitalist roots by endorsing such a plan!

[htuttle]

18. Nothing like having your own words read back to you...

From the Nuremburg trials:

"We must make clear to the Germans that the wrong for which their fallen leaders are on trial is not that they lost the war, but that they started it.

And we must not allow ourselves to be drawn into a trial of the causes of the war, for our position is that no grievances or policies will justify resort to aggressive war. It is utterly renounced and condemned as an instrument of policy."

(snip)

"The following acts, or any of them, are crimes coming within the jurisdiction of the Tribunal for which, there shall be individual responsibility:

(a) CRIMES AGAINST PEACE: namely, planning, preparation, initiation or waging of a war of aggression, or a war in violation of international treaties, agreements or assurances, or participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of any of the foregoing."

(snip)

"No one excuses Germany for launching a war of aggression because she had grievances, for we do not intend entering into a trial of whether she had grievances.

If she had real grievances, an attack on the peace of the world was not her remedy.... Launching a war of aggression is a crime and ... no political or economic situation can justify it."

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Robert L. Jackson
Chief U.S. Prosecutor at the Nuremberg Tribunals
August 12, 1945
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/imt/jack02.htm

Do as I say, not as I do, says the USA.

on edit: This part from the transcript is a bit depressing:

I therefore want to make clear to the American people that we have taken an important step forward in this instrument in fixing individual responsibility of war-mongering, among whatever peoples, as an international crime. We have taken another in recognizing an international accountability for persecutions, exterminations, and crimes against humanity when associated with attacks on the peace of the international order.

Bush went and took a GIANT step backwards. No UN approval, No ICC. Both steps forward taken at Nuremberg are gone.

[Christ was Socialist]

22. You are the leader Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero long live...

Socialism